ANOMALISTS ARE NO LONGER AN ANOMALYPart TwoBy Bernie O'Connor, CFGDDirector of Research and Founder*www.armchairresearch.com

In
this installment we address very specific phenomena and reveal the
number of experiences reported by our respondents with regard to UFOs,
Bigfoot, and Ghosts. We will also investigate the overall belief
patterns of the respondents in an attempt to construct a total universe
of accepted beliefs and to establish an accepted hierarchy of the
unknown.

ANOMALISTS AS PERCIPIENTSOur
respondents are no strangers to experiencing anomalous phenomena first
hand. And mind you, as we revealed in Part One, 92.2% of this audience
is skeptical in nature. A total of 97.3% respondents agreed that
skeptics should be given a fair chance to refute anomalous reports.So Anomalists are open to conventional explanations of their and other people's brushes with the unknown.

But
first, let's briefly revisit the question we began our survey with:
“How did you first become interested in anomalous phenomenon?” 35.7%
reported a first hand experience with something unusual. Now, let us
proceed out into the field and see what type of experiences they were.

LOOK! UP IN THE SKY! 46%
reported UFO experiences, slightly outnumbering Ghost sightings that
came in at 42%. Of those having a UFO experience, 32% said it was a
light in sky, either at night or during the day. 64% thought that what
they saw was a solid object of some sort. 5% claim a close encounter,
3% reported occupants, and 4% felt they were the victim of abduction.
12.4% reported unusual dreams after the sighting, 9.5% claimed a
variety of other affects such as an altered sense of time, fear, awe,
radiation poisoning (one case), and the death of an animal. 5.6%
experienced a heighten sense of psychic ability and 2.6% felt they
received an important message that they need to share with people.
50.3% reported no noticeable effects whatsoever. 54% responding to this
question has never having seen what they believe to be a UFO.

When
asked if they would like to see another UFO, 59.2% voted yes. Under the
heading of second-hand sightings, 53.9% answered that either someone in
their family or someone they are close to saw a UFO as well. In the
general survey, which would include these UFO experiencers, 66.1% feel
that the UFO mystery will someday be solved.

THINGS THAT GO BUMP IN THE NIGHT42.2%
reported a Ghostly encounter. 16.1% felt it was an unknown deceased
person and an equal 16.1% had no idea what they saw. 7.7% felt it was a
deceased family member, and 3.3% felt it was an unknown life form.
57.8% report never seeing a ghost. As for after effects, 29.1% reported
no noticeable after effect at all, 10.1% felt physical discomfort, 7.4%
reported unusual dreams. 6.2% reported a variety of other effects,
including fear and terror, surprise, awe, comfort (one case), and in a
few other cases, continued contact with what are believed to be
spirits. Several animal ghosts such as cats and dogs were also
reported. 3.6% felt they received an important message to share. 0.6%
would welcome a return visit and 51.9% would try to communicate with
it. In the general survey, 61.7% have a family member or know someone
who has seen a ghost.

“THE SMELL WAS OVERPOWERING!”We
now arrive at the smallest reported category, Bigfoot sightings.
Apparently, these encounters are extremely rare. Only 3% reported a
Bigfoot sighting. Of those, 1.7% felt it was more human than animal,
1.1% thought it was an unknown species of animal with animal instincts,
and 1.1% didn't know what they saw. 0.3% felt that whatever it was, it
had intelligence equal to a human. No one felt it had
intelligence greater than a human. (The slight discrepancy is due to
the fact that several people did not answer the question.) The reported
after effects were almost negligible. 0.3% claimed heighten psychic
abilities and the identical number, 0.3% claimed unusual dreams. 2% of
those who did have a Bigfoot sighting had no noticeable after effect
whatsoever.

As for seeing another Bigfoot, 6.9% of the
respondents stated yes, they would like to see it again. Oddly enough
this sentiment is over double of the reported 3% who said they had a
Bigfoot sighting. Perhaps the wide variable here is that some folks
were too shy to report seeing one in the first place. Additionally 6.2%
claim they know someone who has seen a Bigfoot. In the general survey,
59.3% believe that a Bigfoot will never be captured.

THE ANOMALIST BELIEF MATIX (See accompanying Chart)Presented
here for the first time are the results of two simple questions: What
do you, or don't you, believe in with regards to anomalous phenomena?
Our topic listing attempted to cover almost all of the Fortean
categories that are reviewed on Anomalist.com. As I stated earlier,
this study will help identify the overall belief patterns of our
respondents. You can say we conducted a belief census, if you will, of
the citizens of the unknown, the damned, the inhabitants of this
Disneyland of the Gods.

These results helped us to construct
the belief matrix that illustrates almost a total universe of what
Anomalists perceive as reality - and what they don't. It's interesting
that more people wanted to share their opinion of what they believed to
be real as opposed to telling us what they didn't believe in. One
reason for this might be the fact that the respondents are so
open-minded and may feel that the “jury is still out” regarding the
existence or not of a particular category. One respondent wanted to
know why we didn't have an “I don't know” option. We purposely left
that out as we felt that a forced choice was a better indication of a
respondent's belief characteristics.

WHAT DO ANOMALISTS DO WHEN THEY ARE NOT BEING ANOMALISTS?A
little over three quarters of our audience is male, with the remainder
female. The majority of Anomalists live in the U.S.A. They are college
educated, some with degrees. Age-wise they skew to middle-age or later.
The majority hold executive positions are self-employed or retired.
They do not belong to any major organized religions or political
parties. They did however vote in both the past mid-term and
Presidential elections.

WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE ON ANOMALIST.COM?This
question received 200 replies. 35% felt the site was “Excellent.”
Complaints ranged from not enough information about specific areas of
interest, or not enough follow-up to stories and featured news items.
Our respondents have a love-hate relationship with material from
“Pravda.” As it turns out quite a few more people hate it than love it.
There were a few humorous requests for naked pictures of women, one
request was for “Anomalous Porn,” whatever that is, and one request for
“Naked chicks watching UFOs.” Such replies no doubt reflect our
primarily male audience and the small percentage of our readers being
young teens. The strangest request for additional subjects to be
covered on the site was “Clint Eastward.” Yes, Eastward.

SUMMARYWe
found this voluntary survey of a cross section of people who share a
common interest in unexplained phenomenon quite revealing. The results
serve to dispel certain assumptions the media tends to hold about
people with an interest in these topics. The results clearly show
that Anomalists are open-minded, stable, professionally
accomplished, intelligent and educated. If these are the type of people
who feel that something important is going on, then scientists and
government officials had better pay attention to their concerns.

Thank you all, again, for this unique opportunity to learn about you.

Return to Part 1*Bernie
O'Connor has a career that spans over 30 years working in Advertising,
Marketing and Promotion Agencies in both New York and Pennsylvania as a
Creative/Marketing Director. He is also a Certified Focus Group
Director and brings his research, analytical, and marketing skills to
his new company, www.armchairresearch.com, an online survey company
that specializes in creating targeted marketing programs via online
surveys, polls, and quizzes.